After yesterday's surprise announcement about the (pending) redevelopment of Whole Foods Lowest Greenville into WalMart Lowest Greenville, some intrepid neighbors went to the City's Building Inspection Department and pulled a whole bunch of site plans. In addition to paying big bucks for big copies, one neighbor got a parking ticket because he was in the Municipal Building so long - when was the last time you saw anyone from Parking Enforcement write a parking ticket? Me neither (we are starting a fundraiser to pay the ticket off).

We're not sure what documents the Dallas Observer was quoting from for their story, because the City staffer told us we were the first ones to ask for these site plans.

BD and others have done a cursory review of nearly 15 site plan pages, out of more than 130 pages. We'll have a final review sometime next week, and post all the information here.

The documents were filed (in November) by the property address (2218 Greenville) and not by the name of the business. That's how it was kept off the radar of neighborhood folks watching the parking lot.

By Robert Wilonsky / Dallas Observer / Unfair Park

Speaking of Walmart (told you) ...

In the end, turns out, I didn't need Mitchell Rasansky to tell me what everyone already knew -- or guessed, anyhow. Because, as I discovered this morning, the permits were filed with the city two months ago and approved December 29. So, yes, brace yourself, Lower Greenville. You are indeed about to get a Walmart Neighborhood Market in the building formerly occupied by that Whole Foods.

Well, actually, the neighborhood market thing's not confirmed; Walmart officials haven't returned calls or emails sent this morning, and folks in Sustainable Development and Building Inspection can't say for sure. "They never identified it as a neighborhood market," says one of Dallas's senior building officials.

But city officials confirm: There will be a Walmart going in almost directly across from the planned Trader Joe's on the old Arcadia site. And it will occupy only the former Whole Foods and not the next-door Blockbuster: Plans call for filling 34,630 square feet with coolers for meat and produce and dairy products, a bakery and a pharmacy, for starters. Per Walmart's website, "A typical store is about 42,000 square feet." The plan also notes: "No late hours."

Tried calling Rasansky. He's out of the country till Monday.

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Can you identify all the locations in the background??

BD participated in the City's Community Emergency Response Team training session the past two weekends at the Dallas Fire/Rescue Training Center out on Dolphin Road. If you want to be part of a growing and exciting volunteer service opportunity, this group should be on your list.

After 16 hours of classroom training, 50+ students participated in a disaster simulation exercise with almost 30 more volunteers decked out in their bloodiest going to church clothes on Sunday morning. The girls in this photo are Puppettes #3 (left) and #2 (right) with one of their friends (center).

We went to Wendy's on Upper Greenville after the exercise for lunch. The other patrons had no sense of humor, however, and pretty soon we had the center tables to ourselves.

You can see more disaster simulation exercises photos on BD's flickr page. If you are interested in helping build a CERT unit in the Lowest Greenville area, send a note to BD here.

By Brantley Hargrove / Unfair Park

There's trouble brewing in the land of lofts, bros and trolleys. Owners of Uptown spots such as Thomas Ave. Beverage Company, The Nodding Donkey and Si Tapas say they're getting squeezed by irascible homeowners who've had whole swaths of Thomas Avenue and Allen Street designated for residents only, leaving patrons with nowhere nearby to park. And they're afraid it's going to get worse.

"This thing is going to spread all around Uptown, which is gonna be terrible for business," says TABC owner Russell Hayward. "We've been trying to be cooperative and conciliatory, but they're just trying to shut us down."

McKinney Avenue-area establishments like TABC don't have big asphalt lots to accommodate patrons, so they're zoned for street parking. "The intent of that is to rely on the neighborhood for street parking," Hayward says. "The reason they did that was to entice people like me to open businesses where there is no parking. That was fine for 17 years.

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